WebMuseum: Hockney, David Hockney, David TIMELINE: Pop Art Hockney, David (1937- ). British painter, draughtsman, printmaker, photographer, and designer. After a brilliant prize-winning career as a student at the Royal College of Art, Hockney had achieved international success by the time he was in his mid-20s, and has since consolidated his position as by far the best-known British artist of his generation. His phenomenal success has been based not only on the flair, wit, and versatility of his work, but also on his colorful personality, which has made him a recognizable figure even to people not particularly interested in art: a film about him entitled A Bigger Splash (1974) enjoyed considerable popularity in the commercial cinema. Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy 1970 (130 Kb); Acrylic on canvas, 304 x 213 cm (120 x 84 in) His early paintings, often almost jokey in mood, gained him a reputation of leading Pop artist , although he himself rejected the label.

In the late 1960s he turned to a weightier, more traditionally representational manner, in which he has painted some striking portraits ( Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy , Tate, London, 1970-01). He has spent much of his time in the USA, and the Californian swimming pool has been one of his favourite themes ( , Tate, 1967). Often his work has a strong homo-erotic content. Hockney is a brilliant draughtsman and has been as outstanding as a graphic artist as he has as a painter, his work in this field including etched illustrations to Cavafy's Poems (1967) and Six Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm (1969). In the 1970s he came to the fore also as a stage designer, notably with his set and costume designs for Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress and Mozart's The Magic Flute produced at Glyndebourne in 1975 and 1978 respectively. The broader style demanded by stage design is reflected in his most recent easel paintings.

In the 1980s he has experimented much with photography, producing, for example, photographic collages and -- since 1986 -- prints created on photocopiers. Hockney is a perceptive commentator on art and in 1976 published a book on his own work, David Hockney by David Hockney . A Bigger Splash Technically, it is true to say that the Pop movement started with Richard Hamilton and David Hockney in England. Hockney's early work made superb use of the popular magazine-style images on which much of Pop Art is based. However, when Hockney moved to California in the 1960s, he responded with such artistic depth to the sea, sun, sky, young men, and luxury that his art took on a wholly new, increasingly naturalistic dimension. Though one might consider A Bigger Splash a simplistic rather than a simplified view of the world, it nevertheless creates a delightful interplay between the stolid pink verticals of a Los Angeles setting and the exuberance of spray as the unseen diver enters the pool. There is no visible human presence here, just that lonely, empty chair and a bare, almost frozen world.

Yet that wild white splash can only come from another human, and a great deal of Hockney's psyche is involved in the mix of lucidity and confusion of this picture.

Man Taking Shower in Beverly Hills 1964 (110 Kb); Acrylic on canvas, 167 x 167 cm (65 1/2 x 65 1/2 in); Tate Gallery, London Portrait Surrounded by Artistic Devices 1965 (80 Kb); Acrylic on canvas, 153 x 183 cm (60 x 72 in); Arts Council of Great Britain Portrait of Nick Wilder 1966 (100 Kb); Acrylic on canvas, 183 x 183 cm (72 x 72 in); Private collection A Lawn Being Sprinkled 1967 (130 Kb); Acrylic on canvas, 153 x 153 cm (96 x 96 in); Collection of Lyn and Norman Lear Three Chairs with a Section of a Picasso Mural 1970 (100 Kb); Acrylic on canvas, 122 x 152.4 cm (48 x 60 in); Collection of Mr. and Mrs.

Ahmet Ertegun Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures) 1971 (110 Kb); Acrylic on canvas, 214 x 304.8 cm (84 x 120 in); Collection David Geffen Model with Unfinished Self-Portrait 1977 (120 Kb); Oil on canvas, 152 x 152 cm (60 x 60 in); Collection Werner Boeninger Nichols Canyon 1980 (170 Kb); Acrylic on canvas, 213.3 x 152.4 cm (84 x 60 in); Mr. and Mrs. Richard C.

Hedreen Place Furstenberg, Paris, August 7,8,9, 1985 #1 1985 (220 Kb); Photographic collage, 88.9 x 80 cm (35 x 31 1/2 in); Collection of the artist Pearblossom Highway, 11-18th April 1986 #2 1986 (190 Kb); Photographic collage, 198 x 282 cm (78 x 111 in); Collection the artist David Hockney: A Bigger Splash, Mr And Mrs Clark And Percy and more - his most notable works - Mirror Online David Hockney: A Bigger Splash, Mr And Mrs Clark And Percy and more - his most notable works Police are investigating the death of David Hockney's assistant and close friend Dominic Elliott Share David Hockney at the RA in front of his painting A Closer Grand Canyon (Photo: Getty) Share Get daily updates directly to your inbox + Subscribe Police are investigating the death of David Hockney's assistant and close friend Dominic Elliott.

Mr Elliott was taken to hospital in a serious condition by a friend in the early hours of yesterday morning where he sadly died a short time later. Hockney is one of the most famous British artists of his generation and was celebrated at the Royal Academy of Arts last year with an exhibition of his large scale landscapes, called A Bigger Picture. The Bradford-born artist is famous for artworks such as A Bigger Splash, a vivid depiction of a Los Angeles swimming pool, and the portrait Mr And Mrs Clark And Percy. In recent years he has been exploring the possibilities of using an iPad for his artworks. Mirror.co.uk takes a look at his most notable works over the years. Most Read Most Recent Most Read Most Recent David Hockney (b.1937) | Art UK Art UK | Discover Artists David Hockney (b.1937) View all 34 (b Bradford, 9 July 1937). British painter, draughtsman, printmaker, photographer, designer, and writer, active mainly in the USA.

After a brilliant prize-winning career as a student at the Royal College of Art, Hockney had achieved considerable success by the time he was in his mid-twenties, and he has since consolidated his position as by far the best-known and most critically acclaimed British artist of his generation. Read more His phenomenal success has been based not only on his flair and versatility as an artist, but also on his colourful and engaging personality, which has made him a recognizable figure even to people not particularly interested in art. In 1961 he emerged as one of the leaders of British Pop art at the Young Contemporaries exhibition. Hockney himself disliked the label ‘Pop’, but his work of this time makes many references to popular culture (notably in the use of graffiti-like lettering) and is often jokey in mood. His first retrospective exhibition came as early as 1970, at the Whitechapel Art Gallery, London (it subsequently toured to Hanover, Rotterdam, and Belgrade).

By this time he was painting in a weightier, more traditionally representational manner, in which he did a series of large double-portraits of friends, including the well-known Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy (1970–1, Tate, London). These portraits are notable for their airy feeling of space and light and the subtle flattening and simplification of forms, as well as for the sense of stylish living they capture. Hockney often paints the people and places he knows best (his art is frequently autobiographical) and has memorably celebrated his romance with Los Angeles (he first visited the city in 1963 and settled there in 1978), particularly in his many paintings featuring swimming pools (A Bigger Splash, 1967, Tate, London). In these works he skilfully exploited the qualities of the new acrylic paint.Hockney has also been outstanding as a graphic artist: his work in this field includes etched illustrations to Cavafy's Poems (1967) and Six Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm (1969), as well as many individual prints, often on homoerotic themes.

In the 1970s he also came to the fore as a stage designer, notably with his set and costume designs for Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress and Mozart's The Magic Flute, produced at Glyndebourne in 1975 and 1978 respectively. The broader style demanded by stage design has been reflected in his subsequent easel paintings. In the 1980s he experimented a good deal with photography, producing, for example, photographic collages, in which numerous prints are made into a composite patchwork image. Subsequently, he has also produced paintings in a similar vein, using canvases arranged in a grid to create a huge overall image: the largest is Bigger Trees Near Warter (2007, Tate), painted in the open air near his Yorkshire studio, which is made up of 50 canvases in a rectangle measuring about 4.5 m (15 ft) by 12 m (40 ft).

Hockney is a stimulating commentator on art and has published several books on his own life and work, as well as Secret Knowledge: Rediscovering the Lost Techniques of the Old Masters (2001), in which he controversially argues that the use of optical aids such as the camera lucida and camera obscura has been much more common in European art than previously thought. Text Source: The Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford University Press) Share this page Acrylic on canvas 242.5 x 243.9 cm Technically, it is true to say that the Pop movement started with Richard Hamilton and David Hockney in England. Hockney's early work made superb use of the popular magazine-style images on which much of Pop Art is based. However, when Hockney moved to California in the 1960s, he responded with such artistic depth to the sea, sun, sky, young men, and luxury that his art took on a wholly new, increasingly naturalistic dimension.

Though one might consider A Bigger Splash a simplistic rather than a simplified view of the world, it nevertheless creates a delightful interplay between the stolid pink verticals of a Los Angeles setting and the exuberance of spray as the unseen diver enters the pool. There is no visible human presence here, just that lonely, empty chair and a bare, almost frozen world. Yet that wild white splash can only come from another human, and a great deal of Hockney's psyche is involved in the mix of lucidity and confusion of this picture. 'Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy', David Hockney, 1970–1 | Tate Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy 1970–1 Support: 2134 x 3048 mm frame: 2170 x 3084 x 58 mm Collection Presented by the Friends of the Tate Gallery 1971 Reference Display caption Summary This is one of a series of large double portraits which Hockney began in 1968.

He had painted imaginary couples in such earlier paintings as The First Marriage (A Marriage of Styles) 1963 (Tate T00596 ). In the later paintings, the subjects are real couples who were Hockney’s friends. They are portrayed in their home environment in a style which is both realistic and highly simplified. Hockney worked from photographs and life observation, making drawings to resolve composition . Usually one character looks at the other, who looks out of the painting at the viewer, thus creating a cyclical movement of looking. Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy is unusual in that both subjects, Mr and Mrs Clark, look out at the artist and viewer from either side of a large open window which is in the centre of the painting. The viewer, who looks at the painting from a central perspective , will be at the apex of the couple’s gaze out of the painting, a third in the relationship. Percy is the name of one of the Clarks’ cats and refers to the cat sitting statue-like on Mr Clark’s knee, looking out of the window. ‘Mr and Mrs Clark’ are the dress designer Ozzie Clark and the fabric designer Celia Birtwell.

Like Hockney, the two came from the north of England and met the artist in 1961 in Manchester, where Ozzie was studying at Manchester College of Art. Both men went on to study at the Royal College of Art in London. When Ozzie and Celia married in 1969, Hockney was their best man. He painted them in their flat in Notting Hill Gate, west London, an area where the artist and a number of his friends then lived. Hockney chose to paint them in their bedroom because he liked the light there. An etching from his earlier series A Rake’s Progress 1961-3 (Tate P07029 -44) is portrayed on the left side of the painting. He began to make drawings and take photographs for the painting in 1969 and began working on the canvas in the spring of 1970, completing the painting in early 1971. In 1976 he described the painting as one of two works of his to come close to naturalism (Kinley 1992), although many areas of the image have been flattened and emptied of detail.

Hockney has commented that his aim in this painting was to ‘achieve ... the presence of two people in this room. All the technical problems were caused because my main aim was to paint the relationship of these two people.’ (Quoted in Kinley 1992, [p.6].) One technical problem was to paint the figures contre jour, or against the light, something he had been experimenting with in earlier pictures of single figures in interiors. As in a photograph, it was difficult to achieve a balance between the bright daylight outside the window and the relative shade indoors. Because the canvas was so big, Hockney worked on it in his studio, where he set up light conditions that approximated those in the Clarks’ bedroom. He painted the lilies, sitting in a vase on a small table in the foreground of the painting, from life at the studio. He found the nearly life-size scale of the figures difficult to realise and both Clarks posed for him many times. In the event, Hockney painted Ozzie Clark’s head as many as twelve times before he was satisfied. He is depicted lounging on a chair, his bare feet buried in the long pile of a fur rug.

His pose is relaxed but his expression is watchful. Celia stands with one hand on her waist wearing a long, flowing dress and a rather wistful expression. Close to her and therefore, perhaps, associated with her are the lilies, traditionally a symbol of the Annunciation and feminine purity. Likewise, the cat on Ozzie’s lap carries symbolic resonances of the libertine and somebody who disregards rules and does as they please. Viewed in this way, Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy recalls the famous portrait of a married couple, The Arnolfini Marriage 1434 (National Gallery, London) by Flemish renaissance painter Jan van Eyck (approximately 1395-1441), in which a small dog at the couple’s feet represents fidelity. Hockney has pointed out that his painting reversed one of the conventions of wedding portraiture, by seating the man while the woman stands. The gulf between the couple represented by the open window and the gaze of the third party (artist or viewer) turned out to be prophetic: the marriage did not last.

Further reading: Stephanie Barron, Maurice Tuchman, David Hockney: A Retrospective, exhibition catalogue, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York and Tate Gallery, London 1988, p.37 Catherine Kinley, David Hockney: Seven Paintings, exhibition brochure, Tate Gallery, London 1992, [p.6], reproduced [p.6] in colour Catherine Kinley, Hockney: Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy, exhibition brochure, Tate Gallery, London 1995, reproduced on front cover in colour Catherine Kinley/Elizabeth Manchester Read more Display caption Hockney painted this portrait of his friends, the fashion designer Ossie Clark and Celia Birtwell, shortly after their marriage. Hockney, who was best man at their wedding, took great pains over this composition and painted Ossie's head at least a dozen times. The couple modeled for the work on numerous occasions in Hockney's studio, although Ossie's pose was based on a snapshot taken one morning just after he had got out of bed, and before he had put on his shoes.

Celia, a highly successful fabric designer in her own right, continued to act as Hockney's model and muse for many years. Gallery label, August 2004 David Hockney Prints | HockneyPrints.com David Hockney Prints Buy Now from Art.com David Hockney is a much-loved British artist who is best known for his landscape paintings from the Yorkshire countryside, as well as Pop Art work from around the 1960s Some of the Hockney prints available to buy from Art.com include Garrowby Hill and are amongst the finest art currently available from any living artist. You will find more information on the British artist in this website and also opportunities to order copies of his work from approved retailer, Art.com. They have the necessary copyright permissions to reproduce some of the artist's work, which is all on display in their artist gallery, linked to from this page. Britain has had an improving reputation with in art over the past few centuries having long lagged behind other European countries such as Italy and France. Many living British artists are contributing new ideas right now and Hockney is someone who continues to develop his style and take on new challenges all the time, ensuring his output remains relevant.

One example of this would be how his recent exhibition included work created entirely on iPad devices, underlining his desire to try any new avenue of creativity possible. David Hockney has helped to put Yorkshire on the international map, certainly with in the art world. His stunning landscapes as seen with Garrowby Hill below, have really drawn attention to their respective locations in the English landscape and most are in the artist's county of birth. Besides these, the painter went onto America where he continues to spend much of his time and has produced equally impressive landscape paintings there as well. Hockney was seen as a Pop artist in the early days of his career but actually he held rather expressionist methods at that time too, so it would be wrong to categorise him too strongly. As his career developed the artist became far more than just a painter, though that is what he remains best known for. There have been stage designs, printmaking and sketching that have accompanied his continual oil paintings. The Valley in Stalheim, featured above, is a lesser known painting from Hockney but also stunning and very much in line with his typical style for landscape scenes, with clear similarities with the likes of Garrowby Hill shown above.

The Valley landscape has become a popular choice as a reproduction print, even though it is not particularly prominent with in the artist's career. The colours used by Hockney with in his countryside scenes were always bright and uplifting, exactly the sort of thing that people would want to have hanging in their own homes. The photograph shown above is the Valley in Stalheim by David Hockney. It is a lesser known painting from Hockney but also stunning and very much in line with his typical style for landscape scenes, with clear similarities with the likes of Garrowby Hill shown above. The Valley landscape has become a popular choice as a reproduction print, even though it is not particularly prominent with in the artist's career. The colours used by Hockney with in his countryside scenes were always bright and uplifting, exactly the sort of thing that people would want to have hanging in their own homes. There have been untold awards bestowed on Hockney over the years including regional awards as he started to establish himself as an artist, leading all the way up to a Knighthood in 1990 which he eventually chose to turn down.

The artist has always held strong opinions and expressed them freely, be it about his love life, his views on smoking or anything else for that matter. An additional political intervention for Hockney was by participating in a letter signed by a host of famous British artists who were protesting at the continued reduction in funding for the arts from Government sources who have also cut many other areas of their expenditure in recent years. David Hockney has written several books across his career and one of the best known looked into the techniques used by some of the great masters from previous centuries. Studying what has gone before is often a popular pastime for successful artists and Hockney was certainly enthusiastic about doing this. There was a period in his career where Hockney began to create photograph collages which was a very contemporary style which he carried on for several years. Aside from this were elaborate stage sets where he was able to combine sound and colour together in a way which really demonstrated his creative flair. Hockney was to later become less enthusiastic about the flexibility of photography in his art and so he went back to painting, sometimes with oils as he had began his career, and also sometimes with acrylics which he started to use upon first moving to the United States.

Hockney has also become popular across the pond in the United States and has produced a series of paintings there which have also proved popular, taking advantage of the great weather available in Los Angeles, his preferred American base. Several works here are among his best, featuring swimming pools, showers and other apartment settings. Hockney has grown in confidence as his career has gone on and now regularly attempts works on a very large scale, combining up to 50 canvases together in order to give a truly momentous visual impact when a viewer sees the work in person. One example is a A Bigger Grand Canyon, currently stored in Canberra, Australia. Other recent ones have been based on the English countryside. David Hockney Prints are covered in this website which details the career, up to now, of famous British artist David Hockney, with a particular attention to his paintings. Many art fans love to buy Hockney prints, either originals or copies and you can do so from our recommended retailer from the link below, which takes you straight to a list of many of his best paintings as prints, art prints, giclee prints and stretched canvases. Garrowby Hill represents Hockney's colourful style and attraction to his native Yorkshire.

Despite working all over the world it is still his favourite place and also his preferred location for producing his paintings which commonly take advantage of natural landscapes whilst other times were of friendly, flattering portraits. Buy Now from Art.com Mulholland Drive Mulholland Drive is one of the best known Hockney landscapes and you can see that above. Art.com offer this as a print reproduction in their store, so feel free to click through if you like this particular art work. The full name of this painting was Mulholland Drive: The Road to the Studio. Garrowby Hill represents Hockney's colourful style and attraction to his native Yorkshire. Despite working all over the world it is still his favourite place and also his preferred location for producing his paintings which commonly take advantage of natural landscapes whilst other times were of friendly, flattering portraits. Famous David Hockney Paintings David Hockney: English Pop Artist Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy (1970-1) Tate Collection. For a guide to the best of modern UK painters (1960-2000), see Contemporary British Painting .

Beloved English Artist The painter, printmaker, photographer and stage designer David Hockney is one of the most successful and influential of all living English artists. Based in America for much of his adult creative life, his reputation rests on his fine drawing skills, as well as his innovative work in the field of printmaking and photocollage. Seen as a founding member of the British Pop Art movement in the 1960s, he has been the subject of countless solo exhibitions worldwide including a major touring retrospectives staged at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, the Tate Gallery, London in 1988, and the Royal Academy of Arts in London (1995-6). Although he has attracted a degree of controversy for his gay status, he remains - along with JMW Turner and John Constable - one of the most popular of all English artists, and without question the most famous Yorkshire man in the world of contemporary art . (Note: For a comparison with other painters, see: Top Contemporary Artists .) MODERN ARTISTS For an explanation of aesthetics, and a discussion of issues, see: Art Definition & Meaning .

Early Days Born in Bradford, the fourth of five children, Hockney gained a scholarship to Bradford Grammar School where his passion for art made him determined to become an artist and led him to request a transfer to art school. This was reluctantly granted by his parents but only after he had demonstrated the strength of his convictions with a campaign of non-conformity in the classroom, doodling and drawing comic strips in notebooks instead of working at his lessons. He would also pass away afternoons at Sunday School drawing cartoons of Jesus. Yet at the same time his obvious artistic talents won him prizes and recognition. In the end, his parents yielded and sent him to the Bradford School of Art, where he studied anatomy, linear perspective and drawing from the nude, displaying his precocious draughtsmanship in a series of portraits, and oil paintings . Above all, he began to understand that painting was a process of seeing and thinking, rather than mere imitation. His early artwork was abstract while he admired the compositions of painters such as Francis Bacon , and he would often travel to London to visit various art shows. He also started producing his first colour lithographs .

In 1957, he passed the National Diploma in Design Examination with honours, after which he did his 2 years of National Service as a hospital orderly due to his conscientious objector status as a Methodist. He then began a 3-year postgraduate course at the Royal College of Art in London, along with fellow students R.B. Kitaj, Allan Jones, Peter Phillips, Derek Boshier and Patrick Caulfield. Royal College of Art Hockney immediately felt at home in the atmosphere and surroundings of the Royal College, thriving in the kinship of fellow artists, and entered an important period of self-discovery. In particular, he found himself free to talk about his gender orientation with other gay men. First and foremost however, he was a dedicated and highly motivated student, determined to explore as many art forms as possible in order to discover his own style. Thus he turned initially to drawing from life in two elaborate studies of a skeleton before experimenting with abstract art . He was also searching for ways of incorporating a personal subject-matter into his art.

This led him into painting works about his favourite poetry and vegetarianism, and he even began incorporating allusions to his gender orientation, writing words such as "queer" and "unorthodox lover" in some of his pictures. These inscriptions soon gave way to more overt declarations in a series of paintings produced in 196061 on the subject of gay love, which included We Two Boys Together Clinging (1961). The impact of its subject-matter was enhanced by the rudimentary almost childishly drawn figures, scrawled graffiti and the rough texture of the painting surface. These pictures derived much from the faux-naïf idiom of Jean Dubuffet as well as the paintings of Picasso , whose 1960 retrospective at the Tate Gallery had a major impact on Hockney's style. These early irreverent, ironic 'pop' paintings plus his more formal works, together with his growing interest in various forms of graphic art and printwork, rapidly marked Hockney as an artist of great potential. Still only 23, the versatility and flair of his painting, allied to his maturing ebulliant personality lent him an aura of authority.

He was already showing at various exhibitions of modern art , including the London Group 1960. Leading Light of British Pop Art In 1961, along with Peter Blake, Derek Boshier, Allen Jones, RB Kitaj and Peter Phillips, Hockney exhibited at the Young Contemporaries Exhibition (an annual show of works by British art students): an event which first drew attention to the emerging style of British Pop art, and brought Hockney added fame as one of its ringleaders. During the summer he sold several paintings to pay for his first trip to New York, where he and friends visited most of the city's galleries and museums, as well as the trendy gay spots. While there, he utilized the facilities of the Pratt Institute to work on his sketching and painting, including an idea for a modern version of William Hogarth's "Rake's Progress," a printing project which he completed two years later. The atmosphere of personal freedom which he encountered in New York also fuelled his self-discovery. He started bleaching his hair and began to present a new image.

Gold Medal and Early Financial Success Returning to England in the fall to complete his studies at the Royal College of Art, Hockney attracted significant attention from critics, professors, and fellow students at several student exhibitions. His artwork had a poetic feel, and reintroduced narrative in a modern way with noticable irony. In early 1962 he exemplified his growing range with an exhibition of a set of paintings under the title Demonstrations of Versatility, each executed in a different style - flat, illusionistic, scenic, genre-style. The force of Hockney's draughtsmanship, his genre-painting , portraiture, literary influences, strongly personal approach, and increasing maturity as a person, all combined to enable him to establish a clear artistic identity for himself. Despite failing his Art History exams he was awarded the Royal College of Art gold medal for 1962. The following year, he sold the etchings of his updated version of Rakes Progess for the amazing sum of £5,000. This level of commercial success meant that he became independent quite soon after leaving college and, unlike the majority of his contemporaries, did not have to rely on teaching in order to make ends meet.

From this time on, he was represented by the influential art dealer John Kasmin. Los Angeles In 1963, after finishing his studies, Hockney travelled to New York, Berlin and Egypt to get inspiration and ideas for illustrations. In New York he met Andy Warhol , who - along with Roy Lichtenstein - was one of the rising stars of American Pop art. He also saw a friend, Henry Geldzahler, a curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, who encouraged him to visit Los Angeles - which Hockney did at the end of the year. It was everything he expected and more. He arrived knowing nobody, and yet in the space of 7-days he found a place to stay in Santa Monica, arranged a studio for himself, passed the driving test, bought a car, and even drove to Las Vegas where he won some money gambling. The Los Angeles lifestyle and landscape became important features of Hockney's work, in more ways than one. Passing much of the day on the Santa Monica waterfront, he would admire the beautiful boys who paraded along the beach.

To capture the colourful California urban landscape he switched from his beloved oils to the newer medium of acrylics , and developed his own signature style of naturalistic-realistic painting. His 1964 work The California Collector included his first depiction of an LA swimming pool, an image he would repeat countless times, employing a flat, modern manner with looping wavy lines to portray the moving water, and a semi-abstract jigsaw-puzzle surface reminiscent of works by Jean Dubuffet. In addition to pools, his subjects also included the sculpted Californian men he encountered, as in works like Man in Shower in Beverly Hills (1964), while he also began using photography , especially photomontage, to develop his compositions. As one might expect, the Riviera-type anything-goes environment of California had a major impact on Hockney's professional and private life. He had fantasized about the place well before moving there, and had already produced Domestic Scene, Los Angeles (1963), a painting depicting two men in a shower, derived from magazine photos. Indeed, one might say that his move to LA was the realization of his fantasy of a sensual and uninhibited paradise of swimming pools, perpetual sunshine and blonde young men.

It is also fair to say that his bright Californian imagery also appeals to our own escapist tendencies, and may be an important factor in his appeal as an artist. Would we feel the same about him if he had escaped to Bratislava, or Pittsburgh? I wonder. Growing Fame In 1964 Hockney spent time teaching at the University of Iowa and, during the following two years, taught at the University of Colorado in Boulder, in Los Angeles and at Berkeley. Recognition within the arts profession continued to come his way. In 1964, he staged his first American solo show at the Alan Gallery in New York, where he received rave notices and sold every painting. In 1966, he enjoyed no fewer than five solo shows in Europe. In the same year, he met a nineteen-year-old American student called Peter Schlesinger, with whom he had his first real love affair. In 1967, the pair returned to Europe and toured the continent - the same year that Hockney completed his famous painting A Bigger Splash, and when his painting Peter Getting Out Of Nick's Pool, won the John Moores painting prize at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool.

It was also during this period that Hockney began making stage designs for theatres on both sides of the Atlantic. Theatre Designwork It was during the 1960s that he began his lifelong interest in set-design for the theatre, opera and ballet. His first commission involved Jarry's Ubu Roi at the Royal Court Theatre in London in 1966. This was followed by designs for Igor Stravinsky's Rake's Progress (Glyndebourne Festival 1974), and for Mozart's Die Zauberflöte (Glyndebourne Festival 1978), as well as a commission for costumes and sets for a triple performance of works by Satie, Poulenc and Ravel at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Later he created sets for a work by Stravinsky at the Metropolitan Opera, Puccini's Turandot in San Francisco, Wagner's Tristan und Isolde in Los Angeles, and Strauss's Die Frau ohne Schatten at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London. In 1968 Hockney returned to London with Schlesinger, who began studying at the Slade School of Fine Art.

He also painted his first large double-portraits, such as those of Fred and Marcia Weisman, and Christopher Isherwood and Don Bachardy. The year ended with a solo show in New York at the André Emmerich Gallery. The following year Hockney accepted an offer to become a guest professor at the Kunsthochschule in Hamburg in 1969, but at home his relationship with Schlesinger was beginning to deteriorate - a process captured on film in a frank documentary on Hockney's life being made at the time by Jack Hazan. 1970s Meantime in 1970, Hockney's first major retrospective exhibition was held at the Whitechapel Art Gallery in London, and the artist continued to be feted as a major figure in the English art world. The retrospective subsequently toured to Hanover, Rotterdam and Belgrade. In 1971 Hockney completed his most famous piece of portrait art - Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy (later voted the most popular modern painting in the Tate Gallery).

By this time Hockney's worries about appearing modern had receded and he began to have more confidence in allowing his naturalistic portrayal of the world to speak for itself. But some of his pictures from the early 70s continued to suffer from a rather lifeless appearance due to their over-reliance on photographic sources. (Similar criticism has been made of the Scottish contemporary genre-painter Jack Vettriano .) Fortunately, he continued to excel in drawings from life, as exemplified in such pen-and-ink portraits as Nick and Henry on Board, Nice to Calvi (1972). In 1973, Hockney went to work in Paris for a short time, where he collaborated with Aldo and Piero Crommelynck, the former master printers of Picasso, to produce a set of etchings in memory of the great Spanish genius who had died earlier that year. In 1974, the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris held a major exhibition of Hockney's works. It was also the year which saw the completion of Jack Hazan's biographical film on Hockney's life, entitled A Bigger Splash.

Although initially shocked by the film's candour about his gay status as well as his relationship with the much younger Schlesinger, Hockney eventually approved its release. During the mid-1970s Hockney abandoned fine art painting for a while in order to concentrate on drawing and etching, as well as new commissions for stage and theatre designs. His continuing curiosity with differing art forms led him to produce considerable bodies of work in different media, such as the Paper Pools and other pulped paper works of 1978, as well as a number of trial experiments with polaroid and 35 mm photography, in which produced hundreds of composite pictures (joiners) in an attempt to apply the multi-angle analytical Cubist technique to a mechanical medium. In 1978 he took up permanent residence in the Hollywood Hills overlooking Los Angeles. 1980s During the 1980s Hockney turned to photo collage , employing a Polaroid camera. He drove across the southwest United States taking thousands of photos which he then assembled into panoramic montages, such as You make the picture, Zion Canyon, Utah.

(Subsequently, these photo-montages were the subject of a retrospective of the artist's photography at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.) These works were part of a continuing fascination with technical gadgetry that culminated in the production of home made prints on photocopiers, as well as images conveyed by fax machine or devised on a computer. He also replicated some of the perspective theories of these collages in paintings like A Visit with Christopher and Don, Santa Monica Canyon (1984), comprising two canvases measuring approx 2 X 6 metres. In 1981, as a diversion from this camerawork, Hockney participated in the figurative art exhibition A New Spirit in Painting at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, submitting four new paintings. And in 1983, he began a series of self-portraits , enabling the viewer to see the man behind the brush, and exposing his vulnerability in the process. More exhibitions and commissions followed. In 1985 he was commissioned to design the cover and a series of inside-pages for the French edition of Vogue magazine. Another significant commission involved the Quantel Paintbox, a computer software program that permitted the artist to draw directly onto the computer screen.

His resulting work featured in a BBC series on the program. In 1988 a major retrospective of Hockney's work was staged in Los Angeles, which later toured New York and London. 1990s In the 1990s, Hockney continued to play around with new technology. He employed a colour laser copier to create images in some of his works and replicated some of his paintings. Above all, he was impressed with the vibrancy of colour produced by these devices. This constant desire to experiment was also exemplified in the set of Very New Paintings begun in 1992. These were semi-abstract landscape views of the Pacific coast and the Santa Monica mountains, depicted in a succession of plunging perspectives, dazzling vistas, brilliant light and colour, after the style of Picasso and Matisse . In 1995 a retrospective of his drawings opened at the prestigious Royal Academy in London.

This was followed in 1998 by a retrospective at the Museum Ludwig, Cologne; and a similar show at the Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea in Turin, at the Musée de l'Elysée in Lausanne, and at the Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie in Arles, and the Kunsthalle Krems in Lower Austria. The decade ended with a solo exhibition of his painting at the Centre Georges Pompidou, in Paris. 2000s Now in his 60s, Hockney still retained a keen interest in the history of art . In the 2001 television program Secret Knowledge, he asserted that the famous Old Masters of the Renaissance and Baroque used camera obscura techniques to project an image of the subject onto the surface of the painting, reserving for the painter the simple task of filling in the outline with colour.

According to Hockney, this technique explained how these artists were able to achieve the photographic quality of their portraits, although his view has been strongly opposed by the Art Renewal Centre who have published counter arguments in several articles, including experiences of living artists who have no use for such devices yet still produce paintings of photo-realistic quality. In 2006, the National Portrait Gallery in London staged a major display of Hockney's portrait art, including self-portraits, comprising over 150 of his paintings, drawings, prints, sketchbooks and photo-collages completed over the previous 40 years. (See also: National Gallery London ). In 2007, Bigger Trees Near Warter - a monumental-scale view of a coppice in Yorkshire, and Hockney's largest ever picture, measuring a massive 15 feet by 40-feet - appeared in the Royal Academy's annual Summer Exhibition. Painted en plein air on 50 individual canvases, over a period of 5 weeks, the work was donated by the artist to the Tate Gallery the following year.

In 2008, Hockney enjoyed solo shows at The Arts Club of Chicago, Chicago, and Leslie Sacks Fine Art, Los Angeles. His works now hang in the best art museums around the world. Awards and Records Hockney was made a Companion of Honour (CH) in 1997 and is also an Academician (RA) of the London Royal Academy of Arts. In 2004, his work A Bigger Grand Canyon - a series of 60 paintings forming one huge composition - was purchased by the National Gallery of Australia for $4.6 million. In June 2006, his painting A Bigger Splash was sold for £2.6m - a record for a Hockney painting.

Summary Seen as one of the great 20th century painters , Hockney's reputation as an artist rests principally on the quality and precision of his draughtsmanship, as in his portraiture; as well as the quality and diversity of his etchings, as in his set of 16 etchings comprising a modern autobiographical version of William Hogarth's Rakes Progress, as well as his lithographic works and his Illustrations for Fourteen Poems for C. P. Cavafy, for Grimm's Six Fairy Tales and The Blue Guitar. However, these exemplary artworks fail to capture the extraordinary individuality, energetic innovation and sheer talent of the boy from Yorkshire, whose dream was to become an artist. For another painter from Northern England with a quite different style, see: L.S. Lowry (1887-1976), noted for his cityscapes populated by his signature "matchstick men".  For information about contemporary artists, see: Homepage . ENCYCLOPEDIA OF VISUAL ARTISTS Where to Buy David Hockney Prints, Posters & Original Art Poster from Boston Museum Of Fine Arts.

64cm x 61cm (25″ x 24″). £20.00 David Hockney – A Bigger Splash Tate Shop. Archival quality, giclée reproduction on Mondi Colour 300gsm paper. 30cm x 40cm (12″ x 16″). $250 David Hockney – A Closer Grand Canyon 45.7cm x 136.5cm (18″ x 53.75″) rare, offset lithograph poster from 2009. £20.00 David Hockney – Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy Archival quality, giclée reproduction on Mondi Colour 300gsm paper. 30cm x 40cm (12″ x 16″). $350 Buy Online David Hockney – A Bigger Grand Canyon Rare poster of the original oil painting held by the National gallery of Australia.

80cm x 29.8cm (31.5″ x 11.7″) £209.99 David Hockney – Prisoner From Amnesty International Original offset lithograph, edition of 2000 from 1977. 73cm x 60cm (29″ x 24″). £7.50 Buy Online David Hockney – Road Across The Wolds 1997, Royal Academy mini print on card to accompany Hockney’s 2012 solo show. 35.5cm x 28cm (14″ x 11″) £25.00 David Hockney – Dachshund Tate Poster Reproduced from vintage Tate exhibition poster on 300gsm Photo Rag paper. 59cm x 42cm (24″ x 16″). £7.50 Buy Online David Hockney – Garrowby Hill mini print Commissioned for the Royal Academy in 2012. Includes a 5.5cm white border. 35.5cm x 28cm (14″ x 11″).

£25.00 David Hockney – A Bigger Splash Tate Poster Reproduced from vintage Tate exhibition poster on 300gsm Photo Rag paper. 59cm x 42cm (24″ x 16″). $450 Buy Online David Hockney – Celia, Paris Original offset lithograph poster created for the Tel Aviv Museum in 1980. 68.5cm x 49.5cm (27″ x 19.5″). £269 David Hockney – Walking Past Le Rossignol Offset Lithograph poster. 101cm x 50cm (40″ x 20″). David Hockney Poster – A Bigger Picture 76cm x 51cm (30″ x 20″) Original Exhibition Poster, 2012 Royal Academy. $250 David Hockney – Nichols Canyon Offset lithograph poster created for Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark. 95cm x 60cm (37″ x 24″).

$5,100 Buy Online David Hockney – Harlequin From Parade Very rare and collectible 1981 serigraph from an edition of 1,000. Original billboard poster for the Metropolitan Opera. 213cm x 226cm (84″ x 89″) £120 David Hockney – Set For Parade 68.5cm x 68.5cm (27″ x 27″) rare, offset lithograph poster from 1980. David Hockney – Rocky Mountains and Tired Indians 80cm x 60cm (23.5″ x 31.5″) unsigned offset lithograph poster. £1,950 David Hockney – A Wooded Landscape 39cm x 27cm (15″ x 11″) Unsigned etching with aquatint. Edition of 200 from 1969. David Hockney – Figures With Still Life 42.5cm x 34.5cm (16.7″ x 13.5″) Signed etching with aquatint.

Edition of 200 from 1976-77. $4,600 David Hockney – Los Angeles Music Center Unified Fund 55cm x 70cm (21.5″ x 27.5″) Signed poster from 1981. $479.99 David Hockney – Musee des Arts Decoratifs 74cm x 52cm (29″ x 20.5″) Rare original exhibition poster from the Louvre, Paris 1974. $250 Sold Out David Hockney – Beverly Hills Housewife Original offset lithograph. Exhibition poster for the Louisiana Museum for Modern Kunst, 2001. 50cm x 77cm (19.7″ x 31.5″) Sold Out David Hockney – Mount Fuji With Flowers Original offset lithograph, first edition poster from 1972 exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum. 91cm x 61cm (36″ x 24″). David Hockney – Tivoli Amusement Park Poster 1993 Offset lithograph vintage poster (one available).

24.4 x 33.4 in (62 x 85 cm). David Hockney – Mulholland Drive The Road to the Studio 97cm x 41cm (39″ x 17″) Original Exhibition Poster. David Hockney – The Seventeenth V.N. Painting 69.5cm x 83cm (27.5″ x 32.75″) rare, offset lithograph poster from 1994. David Hockney – Blue Guitar: A Moving Still Life 51cm x 46cm (20″ x 18″) Signed etching with aquatint, 1976. AP of 35. Enquire David Hockney – The Old Guitarist 46cm x 53cm (18″ x 21″) 1976, Edition of 200. Signed colour etching with aquatint from Blue Guitar series.

David Hockney – Blue Guitar: Buzzing of the Blue Guitar 51cm x 46cm (20″ x 18″) Signed etching with aquatint, 1976. AP of 35. Enquire David Hockney – A Picture Of Ourselves 46cm x 53cm (18″ x 21″) 1976, Edition of 200. Signed colour etching with aquatint from Blue Guitar series. Enquire David Hockney – Tick It, Tock it, Turn it True 46cm x 53cm (18″ x 21″) 1976, Edition of 200. Signed colour etching with aquatint from Blue Guitar series. David Hockney – A Bigger Exhibition 2016, Royal Academy. Contains 400 illustrations of Hockney’s paintings, iPad drawings, portraits and never-before-exhibited charcoal drawings. Buy Online Hockney Posters – Book 96 page catalogue of posters from David Hockney’s exhibitions published in 1988.

Great resource for finding collectible Hockney posters. See detailed images from inside the book here . 36cm x 27cm (14″ x 11″). Buy Online Hockney Printmaker – Book 2014. Features over 150 Hockney prints spanning six decades from aquatint etchings to lithography to computer printing. By Richard Lloyd. 24.5cm x 28cm (160 pages). David Hockney – My Yorkshire (Book) 2011, first edition by Enitharmon Editions. With David Hockney & Marco Livingstone. 83 pages. (32 x 25cm). Buy Online David Hockney – Just Nature (Book) Accompanying the 2009 exhibition at Kunsthalle Würth featuring landscapes from Hockney’s home county of Yorkshire. With Marco Livingstone & Christoph Becker. Review here . (192 pages (33 x 25cm). Buy Online David Hockney – A Bigger Picture DVD Inspiring documentary filmed over 3 years as Hockney returned to Yorkshire nearing his 70th birthday.

Directed by Bruno Wolheim it’s an enlightening portrait of a hard working painter. 60 minutes + 55 min bonus material. Buy Online David Hockney – A Double Portrait DVD 2012 BBC documentary that follows David Hockney from Los Angeles to London as he exhibits 40 large scale watercolour double portraits, each created within a day. 49 minutes. NTSC format. Buy Online Hockney – Documentary (2014) Really enjoyed the worldwide premiere of this Hockney film where it was broadcast with a live interview from Hockney’s LA studio. Directed by Randall Wright it’s a colourful tribute to a life in art. 112 minutes

Question: Who painted Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy, and a Bigger Splash?
Answer: DAVID HOCKNEY